Already an investor in TT Games, Snowblind Studios and Midway Games assets, Warner Bros. (NYSE: TWX) Home Entertainment is buying further in to the video games market by acquiring a majority of London-based Rocksteady Studios, the developer that made the Batman: Arkham Asylum game starring WB’s superhero.
Group president
When you look at the booming popularity of online games - from World Of Warcraft to FarmVille - it’s hard not to say “let’s have a bit of that”.
That’s what CEO David Levin’s B2B publisher United Business Media (LSE: UBM) (UBM) is saying - it’s buying Game Advertising...
Ty Ahmad-Taylor is the founder and CEO of FanFeedr, a real-time personalized sports feed. Previously, he was SVP of Strategy and Product Development at Viacom (NYSE: VIA) and, before that, Comcast (NSDQ: CMCSA). He tweets at @tyahma
If you are a consumer-facing startup pitching to VCs, the conversation...
—STV/NetPlay: More crossover between online gambling and broadcasters in the UK. Scottish ITV (LSE: ITV) franchise STV signed a two-year distribution deal with NetPlay, an interactive gaming company. The TV deal will see ChallengeJackpot.com broadcast six days a week on late-night TV. NetPlay has deals with Virgin 1, Bravo 2 and Channel Five. (Via
Zynga, the current social gaming behemoth, is using some of its money to do acquisitions: it has bought Serious Business, creators of social games on Facebook. SB, based in San Francisco, and backed by Lightspeed Venture Partners ($4 million in funding), was founded in early 2008 by two former Powerset...
Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) seems intent on making a big entry into the social games space. The company announced a week ago that it would bring titles from social game giant Zynga to its online properties, including MSN and Windows Live Messenger, and now Bloomberg reports that Microsoft...
Viacom (NYSE: VIA), which has seen sales of its Rock Band franchise slow amid the gaming slump, is asking for a refund on its 2007 earnout payment to the Harmonix founders, according to a company 10-K filed earlier today. In October 2006, Harmonix, developer of the Rock Band franchise,...
Break Media, which recently opened up a social gaming studio, has made its first acquisition in the space: It has acquired FileFront, one of the older online gaming news/download sites. The financial details were not disclosed, but Break CEO Keith Richman told me it is in the “seven figures”.
FileFront...
Viacom’s profits rose significantly in Q4, as the company posted modest revenue and advertising declines, beating analysts’ expectations. Global ad revenues fell 3 percent, while U.S. ad dollars slipped 4 percent, held down by slight weakness in the Media Networks and Filmed Entertainment segments. The Media Networks’ operating income grew 3 percent to $921 million...
So Gamefly finally does file for an IPO, after flirting for years with a possible sale: The Los Angeles-based videogame rental-by-mail subscription service has filed its S-1, and intends to raise a smallish up-to-$50 million through it. It plans to list on Nasdaq under the symbol “GFLY”, and underwritten...
Bob Iger wasn’t on stage for the iPad launch last month, but the Disney CEO just gave a demo spiel Steve Jobs, the company’s largest shareholder, would applaud about a “really compelling” device that could be a game changer. Volunteering and replying to analyst questions about how Disney plans to use the new Apple (
Electronic Arts (NSDQ: ERTS)—which continues to try to move its business “beyond the console”—is bringing Madden NFL to Facebook. It isn’t exactly clear what EA has in mind for the Facebook version of its blockbuster video game; EA Sports President Peter Moore tells Bloomberg vaguely that it will be...
